Aphelion
by sigmalied
Summary: A young Aria and her disreputable friends are tasked with handling a runner who has potentially been compromising their illicit business to unsavory parties. Naturally, the conflict turns personal. At sixty-one, Aria already has a firm grasp on the basics of criminal enterprise, but learns a painful new lesson that she'll value for over a thousand years.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** Originally published to AO3 on 2017-04-02.

This is an experimental four-part fic about a young Aria, along with some equally youthful allies, entering conflict with enemies who have close connections to high places. In this part of Aria's life her name is most certainly not Aria, but the name is used nevertheless for ease of reading and to preserve the mystery about who she was born as.

* * *

APHELION

* * *

A finger tapped incessantly against the dashboard, broadcasting her slipping patience. It had been ten minutes since Ynara's reply, which promised imminent emergence from the house. Obviously she was held up by something, and knowing Ynara, it was either by her own tendency to fret in front of the mirror as the clock ticked their date away, or worse, by her overbearing mother who might have impeded her attempt to abscond to the car idling on the driveway. It was a fine vehicle with an executive black body and creamy white highlights, but its modish singularity ensured it would never be mistaken for another, and therefore its owner always identified at a glance. No lies about the company Ynara aspired to place herself in would ever make it past anyone endowed with the mere faculty of sight.

A frustrated exhale left Aria's lips. At this point she was nearly certain that Ynara's delay was inflicted by her mother, with whom she was inevitably arguing with. That was her girlfriend's greatest foible: entertaining arguments well past their proper resolution, and always believing in her own capacity to persuade the other side if only through the power of attrition. But they didn't have time for attrition tonight.

"Wonder what's keeping her," the mildly slurred voice of Pirwa reached her from the back row of seats, followed by the sound of creaking upholstery as attention was directed through the tinted windows and toward the house. "Try messaging her again?"

After some consideration, Aria drearily decided, "No. I think I'll have to go get her." She powered down the car with a few inputs on the control panel, shifted her posture to access her own pockets, and took a quick inventory of her personal items before opening the door. After closing it, she turned back toward the car and gestured for the remaining occupant to roll down her window. "Stay with the car," she said. "Don't come up to the house unless I say so. You look like shit."

Pirwa wryly gazed at her, feeling that her bearing adorned with many inharmonious black tattoos, a piercing or two along her crest, and a weathered black jacket pinned up with visibly infinite diverse metal ornaments, were abnormally tame features compared to those of some of their other friends. But Aria was right. Ambling up to Ynara's strict mother's doorstep, half-drunk off the flask in her hand, would do nothing to improve their case. "Fine," she agreed. "I'll just hop up to shotgun and put some music on. Knowing that old broad, we could be here a while."

"Whatever," Aria ceded. She pushed herself away from the car and began heading up the driveway. Upon stealing a skyward glance she cursed under her breath at what looked to be rain. A finger was placed on the doorbell; a subtle button at the peak of a thin, waist-high metal beam rising up from the porch's bed of well-tended succulents. She made to straighten out her light jacket's collar, but paused when she noticed voices from within the residence, seemingly invigorated by her request for entry. Before long the door swung open, but instead of being greeted by the sympathetic eyes of Ynara, Aria found herself confronting the hard stare of her mother Dishala—on the cusp of her matriarch years and more than experienced enough to spot the trouble brewing in the soul of someone like Aria.

"Get off of my porch," she coldly demanded, her enunciation deliberate and precise.

Aria held fast, steeled in defiance. Not another second had passed before Ynara appeared beside her mother, trying to pry her way into sight. "I just don't understand why you hate her so much!" she exclaimed. "What has she ever done to you, Mother? When has she ever caused either of us problems? You never had a problem with Juviana, even when she got into that big brawl with Mirea's stepson and broke his arm! You know why? It was because Juviana was a _turian_. You were so happy to see me dating another species that you only started complaining when we broke up!"

"That isn't the reason," Dishala hissed. "And you know it isn't. This isn't just another immature 'bad girl' foray of yours. I know her type. I know those tattoos. You're in well over your head."

"Current street style," said Aria, calm and confident.

"Don't you take me for a fool," the matron retorted. "I know damn well who you associate yourself with. I know damn well—"

"Mother!" Ynara interjected. "You _constantly_ subject Aria to your raving and I'm just so sick of it. You always assume you know everything about her and insult her without even giving her a chance! I swear, if you don't let me go with her tonight… maybe I'll just start living with her instead. We could do anything we like, whenever we like, and you'd have no say."

The threat shattered Dishala's resolve. Apparently, that was _the_ worst case scenario in her mind, and she acted appropriately. She fumed but held herself with erect, defiant propriety as she permitted Ynara past the frame of the door where she joined Aria and slipped a possessive arm around her waist. The gesture of closeness was reciprocated; Aria's blatant statement of victory that only infuriated the matron more. As the pair retreated from the porch, Dishala snapped at their departing backs, "Stay away from that disgusting club! So help me, Ynara, if I find out you've been there again…"

" _Goodnight_ , Mother. I'll send a message if I'm not back before midnight."

As the two strode blithely down the gentle slope of the driveway, Aria turned to her date to pose a sly question against her temple, "So, when are you moving in?" She kissed her cheek. Ynara looked so lovely, stylish, and mature in her evening dress and thin coat, yet keeping Aria's fancies wholesome and temperate. Either way, Aria could scarcely keep her eyes off of her.

Ynara smiled. "You know I wouldn't suddenly invite myself like that. I only said it to get away from her. But, if you're offering… maybe it's something we can start talking about."

When they reached the car, Aria retrieved her arm from her girlfriend's waist to rap her knuckles against the passenger side's window. Muffled music thudded from within. Faintly, Aria could make out the silhouette of Pirwa lifting her flask to her lips before capping it, turning off the music, and fumbling with the door handle for a moment before she was able to stagger out.

"Pirwa?" Her presence surprised Ynara.

"Nice to see you, Ynara," she flatly said while relegating herself to the back seats. After climbing in inelegantly Aria closed the door for her and started rounding the car to the driver's side, but Ynara stopped her by gripping her wrist and reeling her in.

"Please tell me you're just giving her a ride home," she whispered mere centimeters from Aria's face. Her brow was drawn with concern.

Aria briefly pressed her lips into a thin line as she stole a glance away, forcing herself to confess the truth. "She's coming with us," she replied upon meeting her eyes again.

"Aria, are you serious? You told me this was _our_ date—just _us._ "

"Something came up. We're only going meet up with some people for a few minutes. Then I'll take you anywhere you like, and we'll do anything you want. Just us."

Ynara eyed her skeptically for a moment before deciding to let it slide. She released Aria, permitting them both to take their seats. With the doors shut, Aria passed her hand over the ignition, lifted the car from the driveway, and brought up the computer's interface to name their destination. Autopilot proceeded to carry them there, freeing Aria's hands so she could lay one on Ynara's knee, but it only remained there for several seconds before Ynara peeled it away and laced their fingers together instead. As they soared beyond the relatively affluent residential district and into the heart of the city proper, small droplets of rainwater began tapping against the windshield and quickly streaking away from their velocity. The curved towers rising around them in a metallic canyon glistened with rebounded violets, blues, and striking yellows; and tonight, Kurinth's comforting glow was obscured by the thickening cloud cover.

"I'm sorry my mother is always so rude to you, Aria," Ynara breached the silence. She stroked her hand with her thumb. "I don't know how you're able to keep composed whenever you're face-to-face. But I'm glad you do. It helps me believe that someday she'll finally come around."

"That'll be the day," Pirwa dryly remarked.

Ignoring the pessimism from the back seat, Aria responded, "There are a lot of people out there who aren't too fond of me. I figure, as soon as you let it get under your skin they've nearly won. Besides, Dishala's just being protective, so at least her motivation is sound. I think I can fork over a little respect for that."

"Oh, there's definitely more to it," said Ynara. "I was dead serious when I brought up my ex. Half of my mother's problem with you is that you're asari. I mean, she's aware that I can barely stand to date outside our race. With Juviana, I liked her personality, liked going out and having fun, but… I just remember how kissing her was a chore to me. Turians are so… _flinty_. Spiny and rough. And then you have to worry about all those allergic reactions if you're not careful. It's a complete hassle. I want something _soft._ " She briefly lifted Aria's hand to her lips, but kept her line of sight directed at the streaks of water running briskly down the window as her mind turned. "She makes me feel like there's something wrong with me. What if there is?"

"That's ridiculous," Aria scoffed.

"Yeah," Pirwa agreed. "If there's something wrong with you, that means there was something wrong with every damn asari who ever lived before we met the salarians. Think of it as just being old school."

"I do, for the most part. But what if I'm just racist?"

After a few seconds over which Aria gradually comprehended Ynara's words, she hissed " _What?_ " and regarded her in vexation.

"Not wanting to be with someone solely because they're of a certain race. Isn't that textbook racism, when you think about it?" Ynara asked. Her tone had become uncharacteristically dire.

"Not when it's a different _species_ ," Pirwa replied, leaning forward to temporarily increase her proximity to the front seats and the discussion taking place there. "It's only by crazy chance that we can reproduce with aliens. And no one thinks _they're_ racist when they aren't interested in being alien-fuckers. Why should we be held to a different standard?"

"I don't know…" Uncertainty weighed heavily on Ynara's voice. "I know I shouldn't have, but last week I read something my mother gave me. Called _Opening your Heart to our Neighbors_. It was a manual about training yourself to be attracted to aliens, for those who aren't. There was even a chapter about sex. Oh, I hated it. Then the author talked about having children, how mating with aliens amplifies genetic recombination and tends to produce the healthiest offspring, and how it's our duty to give our future children the best possible odds."

"You burn that shit, Ynara," Aria said, possessed by a sudden fury that surprised her girlfriend. "You take everything that bitch gave you that even insinuates eugenics and you _trash_ it."

"Aria, I know my mother can be horrible but I don't want you calling her a bitch. Only I can do that."

"Fine—whatever. But I'm serious." Aria gave a short, agitated sigh. "Look, I'm not trying to be harsh. But if you convince yourself to be something you're not, you'll regret it. I can tell you now: if you go out, conform, bond and have babies with some alien chump you don't even like touching, they'll be a fucking cuckold for the rest of their life while you go off looking for intimacy at the clubs and bars you already frequent now. And there you'll brood about how much happier you would've been if you had bonded with someone who fulfills you."

"Aria…"

"What?"

"You're going to make me cry."

Aria turned at once to face Ynara, who had lifted her free hand to touch her eyes with the back of her wrist. Remorse fluxed instinctually in her blood and she squeezed her hand tighter. "I just don't want you to cave when people put pressure on you to live how they want you to," she said quietly. "It's one thing to lie to other people about who you are, but something else entirely to lie about who you are to yourself. It'll make you miserable. You don't deserve that." She unlocked her glovebox, sifted past her lighter, pocket knife, and a sturdy leather case, to produce for Ynara a cloth handkerchief.

"You're always so sure of yourself," said Ynara. She lightly dabbed at her eyes. "You always seem to know exactly where you're going, what you're doing, and what you want… I'm so jealous of that. Meanwhile I still question whether we really are the rowdy, inbreeding chauvinistic youth they accuse us of being, and hate myself for it."

"I'd say about half of that is correct, actually," Pirwa offered. "No shame in giving credit where it's due." Her comment seemed effective in that it brought a small exhale of laughter to Ynara's lips.

"Right," Aria said, tossing a glance over her shoulder to momentarily smirk at Pirwa. "And in your case I suppose the 'inbred' part carries most of the statement's truth?"

"Fuck you, Aria."

. . .

Before long they had reached their destination. It was a club in the dense downtown of one of the smaller Ianthian isles, above whose entrance was fixed a neon sign reading in magenta asari script: _Aphelion._ After leaving the car in a parking structure across the street, the trio hiked out across the pedestrian bridge suspended over the city's lower stratified levels and toward the queue. They did not join the queue, however; Aria led them directly to the bouncer, who amicably acknowledged Aria by name and admitted her party without hesitation after grasping hands with her in pleasant greeting.

The interior of Aphelion was multi-tiered and awash in light of rotating hue, and music driving the activity of the dance floor at the back echoed incorruptibly all the way to the front glass doors. Spotting an alien amongst the crowds was a considerable challenge, where those few present usually appeared in larger groups of friends who had undoubtedly vouched for their unobtrusive intentions. Otherwise, the patrons were almost exclusively asari, as was the racial makeup of the pair they approached at the bar behind which numerous shelves of liquor were enticingly illuminated by icy blue-white. They welcomed Aria and her party with enthusiasm before making room on the seats.

There was Hovi, a disreputable but superficially professional individual dressed in a gray herringbone blazer a half-size too big for her stature, which was of slightly shorter than average height. Hovi stood facing them with her elbows propped on the bar in a stance of objectionable superiority. She was accompanied by the much taller and lankier Eshia, whose attire was less overtly confrontational than Pirwa's but as equally somber in hue and worn to ruggedness. Eshia's features were painted by aggressive, angular red designs that nearly distracted from the crooked bridge of a previously-broken nose, but at certain angles, seemed to only draw attention to it. They hailed the bartender and enjoyed another round of drinks together.

"Aria texted me earlier," Eshia explained to Ynara after leaning in and raising her voice a bit to contend with the music. "She said to not be surprised if you were late. Something about your mother?"

"It's a long story," replied Ynara. "She just hates Aria, is all. Thinks she's big trouble. Maybe that's true sometimes—" She raised an hand, fitted a few fingers beneath Aria's chin, and directed her girlfriend into facing her before she left a teasing kiss on her lips. "—but she's more good than she is bad for me. Did she tell you that we met here?"

"Don't," Aria advised, turning back to her glass to fit her fingertips over the rim.

"I was with friends," she continued. "They're far more accepting of me than my mother. Anyway, a few months ago we were over in the booths having some dinner, and I see this impossibly good-looking creature gazing over at us from the bar. She had this _smolder_ that got me fixated. If someone had shot me in the chest I wouldn't have known the difference. When my friends noticed who I was staring at, they started making a scene, of course. Waving at her, gesturing her over. I was mortified. Especially when she did come over, because that's when she said to me, 'It's unacceptable that I don't know the name of the most attractive person in the building. I thought I knew everyone who was anyone. Seeing you makes me think—maybe I've been deluding myself.'"

While Eshia laughed, Aria amusedly asked Ynara, "You actually remember all that?"

"Well, yes. If you ever leave me for another girl I need to ask her if you said the same to her. That way she'll give you hell for a day or two."

Her cleverness earned much of Aria's attention as they drew closer and each held an arm about the other's waist. The affectionate pose was short-lived, however. The bartender approached the five, stopped in front of Aria, and tapped her knuckles on the bar to steal her focus. Aria looked up in time to hear the words, "The manager wants a word, round back. Says you know the way?"

Aria nodded once before addressing the confused Ynara. She retrieved her arm and contritely kissed her hand before explaining that she had another friend to speak to, arguably the reason why she had to rescind their date's exclusivity in the first place. Reluctantly, Ynara let her go. She was left to spectate the obnoxiously conversing Hovi and Pirwa.

"I'm serious," Pirwa was telling her. "Some asari have trouble conceiving and it's been _proven_ that having sex—intimate massages and stuff—helps stimulate reproductive nerve tissue, dilates it and whatnot. It's in all the scientific papers, I swear. Anyway, that's the kind of doctor I want to be after I go to school. I'm going to help all those pretty future moms have babies."

"Shut up, you drunk pervert piece of shit," Hovi glared. "The only thing they'd let a quack like you do in a hospital is clean out bedpans."

"Oh yeah? Actually, I'll probably end up testing reflexes like this, bitch—" She swiftly scooped up a handful of complementary nuts and assaulted Hovi's face with them.

Somehow Ynara survived them until Aria returned, but she was not there to stay. Only leaving the rationally-compromised Pirwa behind to entertain the dismayed and irritated Ynara, Aria stole away both Hovi and Eshia, led them through the employee-only areas, and out of a back door leading to an alley in which the surrounding businesses deposited trash for municipal pickup.

They stood beneath an awning to shield themselves from the rain. Cigarettes were offered to cut the tension, but only one was lit. Aria had lost her pleasant mood and replaced it with disquieting austerity, alluding to what could only be unsavory news. For a time they watched her stare pensively at the scattered puddles, where reflections of street sconces and neon rippled wildly on the surfaces as water collected, and said nothing as twisting plumes of steam rose from pavement warmed in the early summer sun of cloudless midday.

"The manager showed me a picture," Aria began, sounding abnormally divested for such grave subject matter. "Of Talyra T'Pelas. Taken a few days ago."

"T'Pelas?" Hovi echoed. "That runner girl, right?" A few crumbs still clung to her front, evidence of her bickering about nothing with Pirwa.

Aria nodded, slowly and without removing her gaze from the puddles. "That runner girl," she confirmed. After drawing on her cigarette, she elaborated. "The picture showed her talking to Gaila Atesi. Passing something to her."

"Shit…" Eshia breathed. "It was really them? You're sure?"

Aria nodded again, shallowly this time. "She knows she's not supposed to be talking to Atesi. She knows what it means to us. There's only one reason why she'd talk to her."

"She's snitching on us," Hovi needlessly supplied, peering out at the rain as if the weather were the odious phenomenon responsible for her horror. "To fucking crooked cops… For what? Take us out of the action, monopolize the streets? She's crazy if she thinks this move will elevate her any amount."

"Or she got sloppy," said Aria. "Got caught, wants a plea bargain. The off-the-books sort. Or… maybe she's found some long-term profit in the idea of leveling competition. Easier to price gouge. Bigger cuts for everyone involved. At least, that's the logic."

"But Atesi's still a fucking _cop_ ," said Hovi. "Someday she'll be done with them. She'll make the big bust all herself and retire to the cushy life while her scum rots in prison. Goddess, how can T'Pelas be so damn stupid?" She curtly pushed back the tails of her open blazer to rest her hands on either side of her belt, into which her black high-collared shirt was tucked.

"We still have some flexibility," said Eshia. "T'Pelas doesn't know our real names, doesn't know our faces, and doesn't even know that we know her. She just knows some dead drops."

"And that means Atesi knows some dead drops," Hovi grumbled. "Now our operation comes screeching to a halt. We need to let all the other runners know to lay low _immediately_."

"Already taken care of," said Aria. "A warning was sent out through the anonymous channel a long time ago. The manager was patient in letting us know because we're the ones who are going to handle things. _Handling_ takes preparation."

Hovi nodded in contemptuous understanding while tapping her foot against the ground, producing a rhythmic click with her toe of her expensive shoe. Then she shook her head as if belatedly finding the position they had been forced into abysmally unjust. "Why do we gotta _handle_ T'Pelas? What kind of resources does corporate think we have? What do they expect us to do, buy her back?"

"You can't buy loyalty," Aria replied. "It'll go to the highest bidder sooner or later and we'll be back to square one."

"Then what do we do?" asked Eshia. She fidgeted with the leather sleeve of her jacket. "Aria? You got a plan?"

"Yeah, I've got a plan," said Aria. She tossed her cigarette out into the curtain of rain, watching the burning flicker of orange go dark as she stuffed her hands into the pockets of her pants and glared icily at nothing in particular. "We put T'Pelas out of business for good."

"You don't mean…" Hovi hesitantly began. The darkness congregating in Aria's expression revealed her intentions, and they were most certainly drastic. "No way, Aria. Fuck that. It's one thing to get locked up over dealing, but murder? I don't fuck with that life."

"I'm not going to prison period," firmly stated Aria. "She needs to be silenced and I don't care how. Hell, I have an unregistered dhaka in my glovebox. Semi-automatic. I know her address and usual haunts, and I can get access to perchloric within a few days if we need it."

Hovi's complexion went several shades paler. "Holy shit, Aria, slow _down_ ," she said. "Perchloric? Are you insane? That shit _explodes_ if you're not careful with it! You know what—no. No way are we even considering this. That is not part of my job description. There's gotta be another way, you two. I'm no killer, okay? Think _harder_. What if we just scare her? Send a message, you know? You said you know where she lives—so how about we go trash her living situation? If it freaks her out enough maybe she'll turn useful down the road. Give us the word from the precinct every now and then."

"I've got bats and paint," Eshia instantly offered, just as eager to exit discourse about murder as Hovi. "Can't rent a cab because we'll be on record, but we can take one of our cars, park a block away, start hopping gates, and lay ruin to T'Pelas's property. How about it? She'll know someone's out to get her by morning if we don't wake her up with all the racket."

"She lives in a condominium, so we'll have to be quick," said Aria. "But… I think we can work with this. Best improvement over my plan is we're not in charge of cleanup." Seeing their hard, incredulous stares, Aria added as if surprised at their severity, "Just a joke. You were right about something important, Hovi. Don't waste resources. If we can turn T'Pelas into a mole, she might become an even bigger asset than she was previously. Hopefully that's all it'll take—a little encouragement from us."

"Nice!" Hovi clapped and rubbed her hands together with excitement. "We'll load up Eshia's junker, right? Aria's ride is too flashy for this kinda op. We're gonna need some outfits, too. Masks, hoodies, gloves. I can supply those. When do you want to head out?"

"How about we meet at Eshia's place half past two?" Aria proposed.

"Sounds good," Eshia agreed. "I'll have the car ready to go."

. . .

Discreetly they parted ways, but not before Hovi uttered a final curse of, "Fuck, should've just sold candy bars. Light bulbs or some shit." She and Eshia left Aphelion to begin their preparations while Aria returned to save Ynara from hearing more of the long, pointless tale Pirwa was weaving at the bar. Ynara accepted her offer to buy her dinner to compensate for her inattentiveness, but before they left the bar to slip into a booth, Aria harshly demanded that Pirwa sober up and call a cab home. With so many plans in place for the night, Aria didn't have the mindset for babysitting and couldn't be bothered to drive her anywhere. Pirwa whined but acquiesced.

When Aria settled in with Ynara, they sat abreast and not across from one another as they browsed the menu projected from a tablet mounted in the table. Aria looped an arm about her waist and bade Ynara to order whatever she wanted, trying to thaw her lasting irritation at being neglected. Her success was gradual. By the time their food had arrived Ynara had become fairly well-disposed to her again, perhaps cheered up by a hot meal more than Aria's determination. They shared a platter of marinated, beautifully marbled meat sliced thinly and fried in oil along with fresh vegetables, and another plate of miniature grilled sandwiches stuffed with minced and seasoned lunch meat—Ynara's long-time favorite.

Leaving a morsel poised on the end of her utensil, Ynara postponed her dining to say, "Pirwa told me that you're going to apprentice under Matriarch Visela. She said she's already selected you to be one of her new students. I hear she only takes on ten at a time and there's maidens all over the _planet_ trying to get her attention. Is it true?"

Aria closed her eyes to exhale at Pirwa's indiscretion, but nodded. "It's true."

"I know you've talked about wanting to be a huntress in the past, but, I thought you were going to stay on the wait list for school. Weren't you going to study business?"

"I thought about it," said Aria. "But I'm too restless." She tried to eject herself from the conversation by filling her mouth with another bite, but there would be no simple escape.

"You'll be leaving," Ynara persisted. "For years."

"Yeah," answered Aria after swallowing. "I'm supposed to leave in six months."

Ynara grew intensely introspective for a moment before concluding, "I don't want to guilt you or discourage you, because a big decision like this… I can see it's extremely important to you. But I have to ask—will you still keep in contact? Or… is this a new beginning for you?"

"I'll keep in contact," Aria reassured her. Beneath the table she found Ynara's hand resting in her lap and grasped hold of it. "The training is supposed to be rigorous but it isn't as though I'll be under communication embargo. I can still talk to whoever I please."

She seemed relieved to know that Aria's imminent departure would not necessary terminate their relationship. "I hear Visela's as religious as she is selective. Are you going to pray with her and the other apprentices every morning and evening?" Ynara smiled.

"If it makes me the best damn commando in the hemisphere, then I don't see why not." Charming nonchalance bled from her tone.

That made Ynara laugh, finding the image of a pious Aria completely comical. "So how were you selected? What's her process like, what was she looking for? What made you stand out?" She leaned into her.

"Well," Aria began, "she just told applicants to impress her. So Pirwa helped me make a short vid—jumped across a few tower rooftops and stopped a car doing two-fifty." She shrugged, but no modesty was conveyed. "Idiotic stunts we used to pull when we were in our thirties. I like to think I've always had noticeable aptitude. I was pleased to see the matriarch agree."

"Or maybe she thought it wise to contain you for being a danger to society..."

Aria smiled with moderate pride. "What about you, Ynara? While I'm gone, what'll you be doing? University, right? Still planning on being a curator?"

"Probably," she replied. "That, or maybe I'll teach history at a university somewhere. It's hard, deciding. Sometimes I wonder how so many people can bear sticking with one field or profession. There's just so much to do and see, to _be_. I hope I never end up entrenched somewhere in mundanity like my mother, repeating the same day over and over, never possessed by the urge to venture beyond the closest supermarket. Is that a weird fear to have?"

"No, not at all," said Aria. With her spare hand she gripped Ynara's knee, filling her palms with as much of her girlfriend as possible without displaying prurience, and continued, "I feel precisely the same."

She might have elaborated, or spun her words to imply that she felt such capriciousness for all matters save Ynara, had not a body stepped into the path of the multi-colored beams that once set their table wonderfully alight. Perturbed, Aria's gaze lifted to a find a familiar face beholding them with an amiable expression; a gentle smile whose insincerity could be keenly perceived through a brittle shell of solicitude. While Aria's eyes widened upon identifying who had approached them, Ynara remained oblivious and merely inquisitive, thinking her to be another friend of Aria's. And she seemed to be correct, as far as she was led to understand.

"Hello. I'm terribly sorry to intrude on your dinner," said the asari. "I was just so curious I had to introduce myself, seeing as you're obviously close to Aria. Me and her, we used to be good friends. If she's taken a liking to you, then you must be something really special."

"Well I'm always happy to meet Aria's friends. I'm Ynara," said she, reaching out to grasp the stranger's hand in greeting. "Ynara Rausi. Pleased to meet you."

"Talyra T'Pelas," said Ynara's new acquaintance. "Ynara… what a dreamy name. I'll definitely remember it."

Ynara issued a polite smile but glanced back at Aria in perplexity, unable to figure why she was suddenly grasping her twice as hard as before, or why she stared at Talyra as if she were a hideous phantom; fixedly, with wild reproach trembling in her irises, like a branch in a gale about to snap.


	2. Chapter 2

CHAPTER 2

* * *

 _"Are you shitting me? She just strolled right up to you in broad day—broad night—well, out in the open like that?"_ Hovi grunted on the line. The strained vocalization was followed by indistinct shuffling and the sound of a car door being shut. _"How the hell did she know you? I thought the runners were never supposed to know our faces! What gives!?"_

"I don't fucking _know_ , Hovi," Aria said. "That's why I'm calling you. Someone's fucked us over."

 _"So did she realize you knew her?"_ asked Hovi, slightly breathless. _"Or did she just think you gave her eyes like, who is this bitch?"_

"I don't know," she repeated. While leaning against the wall of the deserted corridor connecting the club to its back alley exit, Aria turned her glare toward the ceiling where dreadfully swirling shapes manifested through a thin screen of smoke-dusted air drifting into vents. She stroked an exasperated hand over her features and rubbed her eyes as though she could erase the waking nightmares creeping into her skull. "I don't fucking know what happened. Maybe she was watching the dead drops. Took a picture of one of us during retrieval and searched the face. Matched it to the damn social extranet accounts I told you to delete, Hovi. I don't care how many friends you think you have, I _told you_ that profile was a liability!"

 _"Hey, hey! We don't know that for sure, okay? And I ain't the one looking to do us in. That's T'Pelas, not me. Well… what did she want?"_

"She fished Ynara's name," came Aria's hollow reply. Raw malice burned in her stomach like napalm and her fingers almost shook with want of violence, reminding her of the clammy hands of addicts yearning for their personal packages, some addressing her like she was the Goddess, others like she was a demon. And others yet like she didn't exist at all.

 _"Shit,"_ breathed Hovi. _"You think…?"_

"Yeah. I think she's going to look her up. And she can. Ynara's house is listed in the public directory."

 _"Well where is she now? Ynara, I mean. Is she okay?"_

"She's at the bar," said Aria. "I told the bartender to keep an eye on her and let me know the instant T'Pelas, or anyone else, tries to get cozy with her."

 _"Shit, Aria. What are you going to do? You've gotta get her someplace safe, right? She can't go home while some asshole might be out there itching to wring her neck. There's a lot of undesirables who would like nothing more than to wreck our business. You know who's running wild these days? Atesi's nuclear option, Neris. Fresh outta jail, to no one's surprise. I heard they originally locked her up after she tore off someone's jaw with her bare hands! But then her case got appealed and they made it look like self-defense—"_

"I know about Neris, Hovi," Aria growled impatiently.

 _"Well then you know what I'm getting at."_

"Yeah. Sure. I'm going to convince Ynara to stay at my place for a while. But _fuck_ —her mother's still at her house. I may not be one to shed any tears if something were to happen to Dishala, but Ynara would. Fuck."

 _"Then clue in Ynara, let her know the stakes. Get her mother to high ground."_

"No. It isn't a good time."

 _"No?"_ Aria's immediate and somewhat unreasonable response brought a confused tremor to Hovi's voice. _"What the hell do you mean by 'not a good time'? Is there some special gift-wrapped opportune moment waiting for you a quarter past one or something?"_

"I can take care of her myself," Aria said. Despite her initial assertiveness, her tone and volume quickly diminished to accomodate a secret. "And…" She shoved her hands into her pockets as a rough exhale of resignation departed her. "And Ynara doesn't know about what I do. Not yet. I don't want to tell her under these circumstances, not while we're in such a mess."

 _"Really? She's still in the dark? Then where the fuck does she think you get all your money from, selling car insurance?"_ Hovi was bewildered.

"Something like that." Aria retrieved a hand from her pocket, along with it pinched between her fingers a wrapped mint she had lifted from a dish near the bar. She busied her agitated hands with peeling open the wrinkled plastic. "Listen, Hovi. I like her. I like her a _lot_. I don't want to screw this up, especially not months before I'm scheduled to leave. Just… do me a favor and get some of our girls over to Ynara's place. Have them keep an eye on it, okay? For a night or two."

 _"I'll give them a call, yeah. I just hope you know what you're doing."_

"I've got things under control." She intensely deliberated while rolling the mint on her tongue, slowly and absently, keeping the transluscent wrapper in hand. Aria examined it as if the creases professed legible text.

 _"So does that mean it's just me and Eshia tonight? You bailing on us?"_

"No, I'll still be there. Same time as we agreed. Maybe I'll get lucky and T'Pelas will be home by then so I can bash her fucking brains in myself."

 _"Damn, Aria, why do you always gotta make everything so personal?"_

" _She_ made this personal. People always make things personal. Why be some high and mighty exception when everyone can just get what they deserve?" Aria awaited a reply. Strangely, the garrulous Hovi had none to give, inspiring Aria to say at last, "I have to go. I've supposedly been at the restroom long enough. I'll talk to you and Eshia later."

 _"All right. You two stay safe."_

. . .

After ending her call with Hovi, Aria returned to the bar to rendezvous with Ynara. By the time the pair departed the nightclub it was a half hour to midnight—more than enough time to take Ynara home before her mother called the police—and that had indeed been the plan up until recently. Beneath a shimmering dome constructed from Aria's biotics to bring them respite from the common tropical downpour, she turned to behold her girlfriend's profile, finding Ynara staring straight ahead with a bearing of complacent neutrality; pleased to be where she was at present clutching Aria's arm as they headed into the parking structure together, ignorant of all trouble the night may yield, and hopelessly adoring Aria of whom she suspected nothing offensive.

Aria collapsed her biotic shield once they entered the structure. The sound of water cascading down drainage pipes and shunts filled their ears as they navigated to her car and found it faithfully awaiting them, a shining jewel amid the row of duller vessels.

Settling into the warm interior, Aria searched for Ynara's hand and grasped it in hers while using her unoccupied one to interface with the control panel. Never before had she been so consistently afflicted by the urge to touch another, to achieve some state of relief for a swollen, youthful heart which had apparently outgrown her brain. Once that bridge between their bodies had been reestablished, Aria said to her, gently as though to mimic the cadence of rain murmuring in the sky, "I know I didn't take you on the date you expected. So why don't I make it up to you?"

"Listen to you, being all polite and repentant." Ynara smiled. "I would normally say no to spite you, but…" She lifted her spare hand to place two fingertips against Aria's lips, keeping her chin softly tucked against the peak of her palm. "I look at that marvelous face of yours… and I can't bring myself to do it."

Concurring with the assessment, Aria pouted her lips to kiss Ynara's fingers, then issued her proposal once they were removed. "How would you feel about staying at my apartment tonight?"

"Oh, Aria…" Her audible reluctance revealed the point of convergence for desire and common sense. She was obviously tempted, but as usual, Dishala held her back. "I can't. My mother would have a heart attack."

"How long are you going to let your mother control your life, Ynara? What's wrong with letting her know that you'll see her tomorrow and leaving it at that?"

"She doesn't control me," Ynara argued quite soberly. "I just choose to accomodate her, well, because she's my mother. Despite our disagreements, I still love her and I don't like seeing her worry. If I send that message, she'll know exactly what we'd be doing."

"Really? And what would we be doing?" Aria feigned ignorance.

"You _know…_ "

"What, watching vids?" Aria supplied, keeping her ruse intact. "Listening to some music, falling asleep to the storm? Or did you have something else in mind?"

Ynara rolled her eyes when she saw the smile tugging at Aria's lips.

"We can do that too, if that's what you're craving," said Aria.

For a time Ynara watched her as she pondered her answer. Eventually she lifted an arm to activate her mail client, keyed something out, and closed the window before fitting her gaze against Aria's. Her features offered an emulsion of satisfaction and concern. "There," Ynara said. "I sent her a message. I told her I would be out late with you and your friends, and that we'd all be staying at your place tonight. Although, now that I think about it, maybe that wasn't such a good idea. She's probably thinking I'm to be the centerpiece of some unholy pureblood orgy…"

"With Hovi, Pirwa, and Eshia?" A scoff distorted their names. "Are you kidding me? Those gremlins are the last people I'd ever be caught screwing around with." With their destination determined, Aria seized the opportunity to start the car and plot a course for home, as if to crystallize Ynara's decision. On her authorization the car lifted away from its parking station and began hovering down the row, toward the nearest exit. Aria continued, "And to be pedantic… Pirwa's the only pureblood among us. Eshia's father was salarian. Hovi's was elcor, but don't believe her. They must have been volus."

"I don't understand why you all poke so much fun at her height," said Ynara. "She's not even that short. Plus, you're wrong about one thing. Pirwa's not the only pureblood among us. There's also me."

For an initial second Aria was unresponsive to the claim, then all her attention centered on Ynara's meaning. "You told me your father was turian."

"And that's what my mother wants me to tell people," Ynara said with a sigh. "Aria, you know enough about my mother to know that she has problems with… overreacting to certain topics. But it doesn't come from nowhere. You see, when she had me, her family was cruel to her about it. They had money and a good name, so they saw Dishala's actions as soiling their bloodline. They were so cruel to her about it that my mother took their vitriol to heart and turned it into self-hatred. Let her humor go rancid and bitter. She never bonded again, just raised me alone. I'm honestly surprised she didn't end up resenting me too, but you've seen how hard she tries to dissuade me from dating asari. She hates seeing me tempted to start making the same 'mistakes' she did. Maybe she's gone a little crazy over the years. I think that really could be the case at this point. Sometimes I wonder if she's actually convinced herself that my father _was_ turian. People do that sort of thing—lie to themselves until it becomes true."

Aria said nothing.

"I don't know why I didn't tell you earlier," said Ynara. "I could have."

"I don't mind," Aria concluded. She aimed her gaze forward, through the windshield, at the dark wet cityscape into which her car crawled with vigor. "Tell me things when you're ready. Not a moment sooner."

"Just like that? You're not even remotely upset that I lied to you?"

"Why would I be? You had reason. You were protecting your mother. At least, that's what _she_ believes constitutes protection. Either way, your life isn't mine. You're never obligated to tell me everything about yourself. But if you want to… that's fine too."

Ynara beheld her in disbelief, baffled by this strange creature who stole her heart in the serene indigo light of Aphelion just months ago. Over that meager span of time Ynara had realized that Aria was very different from the people who regularly populated her life, and yet, by no means did she find Aria particularly spectacular. Rather, the way Aria openly played with perception like clay, found opportunity in fortune and misfortune alike, and so confidently gave voice to thoughts that swirled in her head constantly on the verge of _something_ , inflicted Ynara with the sense that someday Aria would know everything worth knowing, and have done everything worth doing. What remained unknown to Ynara was when exactly that status would be achieved. Indeed, being around Aria felt like an epiphany about to occur. A miraculous moment where scattered primordial dust coalesced into a modern galaxy filled with light and premonition.

How could Aria not be destined for greatness on some level? She was always so busy, always thinking and planning and confronting her daily obstacles while completely pleased to be the sole architect of her life, beholden to no one. To Ynara, this special autonomy and self-determination made Aria's presence glamorous beyond description. She carried with her the ultimate luxury for those armed with robust sensitivities and those free from authorities like Dishala. Maybe, Ynara frequently thought, Aria would take her along with her someday and they might flee the restless prisons of their lives together.

In the warmth of her clean bedroom they watched an old film together. Midnight came and passed as the murder investigation and its romantic subplot unfolded predictably, but entertainingly. Aria was a model of self-control. Meanwhile Ynara could hardly bear to keep her hand separate from Aria's thigh, feeling her lean and unimposing muscle beneath her fingertips and wishing that skin were against her lips instead.

When the vid rolled its credits, Aria slid her hands and biotics up her dress and at last fulfilled Ynara's daydreams of intimacy. It was just like their first time—the first time Ynara had been with anyone; she thought she'd die—and their second time. This was their third. And Ynara _was_ counting, if only to continually remind herself of the permanency of firsts, seconds, and thirds, and how through their numerical immutability Aria would forever be part of her even if they were fated to grow apart. Always would Ynara recall the way she whispered wonderful things in her ear and kissed her while resisting the haste of someone overly concerned with a summit and not the climb. Her patience made their time together sacred, despite how this patience might have rather hinted that Aria wasn't even _that_ _good_. But whether she was or was not mattered little to Ynara. In the absence of a baseline comparison she gladly permitted herself to believe in Aria's skill simply because it was _her,_ this beautiful being of incredible joy, dynamism, and mystery who made her heart shudder and dissolve in her bed's white sea of sheets.

. . .

After sitting up in her shorts and sleeveless undershirt, Aria escaped her blanket and applied a finger to a switch on her nightstand, activating the lamp. The soft glow of the teal clock at its base read two in the morning precisely. She threw a glance over her shoulder to confirm that Ynara still slept undisturbed by her motion, enabling her to open the nightstand drawer and retrieve a pen and notepad. Holding the cap between her teeth, Aria applied the pen to the first line of the top sheet and began to write beneath the small halo of fiery light:

 _Ynara,_

 _Pirwa called me. Says she's feeling really sick. I'm going over to her place to make sure it's not alcohol poisoning, or that she's done anything on top of drinking. We'll be okay. I know how to handle a situation like that. If you wake up before I'm back, just check your messages. If anything's happened I'd let you know. If I don't send anything, assume that no news is good news. I should be back by morning._

 _Aria_

She left the notepad on the nightstand and rose from the edge of the bed. Quietly she gathered her clothes, headed for the bathroom, and dressed herself. Although visibility was meager, Aria glimpsed herself in the mirror upon seeing her head emerge from the collar of a solid black sleeved shirt. In the pale night she reminded herself of her mother. Cold ambition reflected off metal, staring back at her, piercing her with oppressive analysis. And there too was the memory of her father's scalding passion, coiled up like a serpent behind the glass and still offering her acceptance beyond death itself. Both of them colliding like the sudden end of the universe.

Aria watched herself for a full minute to calm and hone her nerves. It was an exercise championed by history's commandos of highest excellence, whose writings she had scoured, and whom she would join one day. Their common method entailed so careful a focus on the fleshiness of the guise that they were able to distance themselves from singular identity and become living biotic artillery. Loaded, aimed, and fired with such force and finesse that the light of massive stars bent and creaked wearily in the void as huntresses of legend passed; inexorable and eternal.

There was a considerable chance that T'Pelas would be home and anticipating visitors akin to Aria's company. She was prepared for such a scenario. She even desired it. Her allies on the other hand would perhaps not be of similar mindset, but compensating for their inexperience was well within Aria's ability. Her dhaka was in the car, its magazine full. And her conscience was immaculate.

She concealed the firearm in her waistband after driving to Eshia's apartment in the inner city, keeping the safety on in proper appreciation of her organs. The rain had thinned but remained consistent, and the low rumble of thunder brooded in distant skies. While waiting outside the garage complex for Hovi and Eshia to admit her, Aria turned back beneath her dome of biotics and was illuminated, briefly, by a lance of lightning spearing the surface several kilometers away. A count of seconds preceding the clamor revealed to her that the storm was moving east, toward next island of the archipelago. In the direction of T'Pelas's home.

With a mechanical whir the garage's door retracted into its alcove in the ceiling, exposing the tidy aisles filled with the vehicles of residents, none of which were particularly impressive. Aria ventured within, following Hovi's voice until she spotted her and Eshia beside the car, already in their disguises. They were figures of virtually uninterrupted black, from their drawn hoods to their gloved fingertips, and down to where their pants were tucked into their boots. The only visible skin was perceived on their faces, still without masks and expressing an unstable union of excitement and anxiety.

"You're late," Hovi said. She tossed Aria the bundle of dark clothes reserved for her.

She caught them before glancing at her wrist. "Two-thirty exactly," replied Aria.

"Yeah, well… Let's just get in. Get this over with."

The three climbed into Eshia's car, an older model with a few dents and chipped paint. Aria took the back, braving the stale air and stiff seats to give herself enough room to change while Eshia started the car and left the garage. She kicked aside an empty beer case and proceeded.

"Full hazmat style, Aria," Hovi advised as she listened to the rustling of clothes behind her. Unbeknownst to both of them, Aria discreetly removed her gun from her pants and laid it on the seat beside her until she finished swapping wardrobes. "We aren't leaving anything behind that'll lead them back to us," continued Hovi. "The rain should help wash away stuff. Maybe not footprints, but no one catches someone based on their footprints. Right?"

"Hardly," said Eshia. "Usually they only corroborate that sort of thing when they've already got you as a suspect. I think."

"Yeah, that's right," agreed Hovi. However, she did not sound convinced. To presumably direct her thoughts elsewhere, she asked Aria, "So how's Ynara? How'd that go?"

"She's staying at my apartment. Last I saw she was asleep. I left her a note, saying I was going over to Pirwa's because she was sick. So if she mentions it to either of you down the line, that's where I was tonight. And Pirwa was just being dramatic."

"And what about Pirwa?" Eshia inquired. "She'll be pissed when she hears what she missed tonight. This is her kind of job. She get home all right?"

When Aria finished lacing her boots, she pulled on her gloves and said, "She messaged me around midnight. Couldn't read half of it, but she's fine."

Silence consumed them for several minutes before Eshia boldly asked, "What do you think T'Pelas was trying to do? We're missing something, aren't we? Showing her face in Aphelion like that was seriously dangerous. I mean, the manager wouldn't do anything about it in public, but if a knowledgable worker got security to bring her round back…"

Hovi sharply dragged an index finger across the front of her throat. "I hear you on that. Maybe she didn't realize we had evidence against her. Thought she was safe. Big mistake. What do you think, Aria? You're the one she came up to. Did she do or say anything particularly weird?"

"Just the fact that she knew my fucking name," Aria muttered. "The higher you are on payroll, the more names you know. That's just how we run things—for security. Never the other way around. And what she's going to do with Ynara's name is obvious. She's going to try to use her against me. Maybe to ransom when we come after her. And by that I mean when we come after her _for real_."

"You think scaring her isn't going to work?" asked Hovi, sounding riled. "So what are you saying? That we're heading out tonight to get muddy and soggy for nothing?"

"I'm _saying_ it wasn't my plan."

Contempt plagued the atmosphere in Eshia's car for the remainder of the ride, but it was more so borne from the frightening unknown than from any true hostility between passengers. Action soon proved to be their cure. The very instant Eshia brought the vehicle down to the deserted lot of a closed convenience store three blocks from T'Pelas's condominium, Aria and Hovi bolted from their seats to access the storage compartment where their instruments of destruction lied waiting.

"What'll it be?" Hovi asked Aria while rummaging about their supplies. "Paint? Metal bat? Ice pick? Sledgehammer?"

Aria required very little time for contemplation. "Bat," she immediately chose, and gave it a few measured test swings once gripped firmly in her padded gloves.

Armed with weapons and purpose, the three disappeared into the tight alleys between homes and businesses to evade visibility, and gradually made their way to T'Pelas's residence. Biotically vaulting themselves over the bleached stone of walls succumbed to overgrown vines, skirting and ducking behind decorative palms in the gardens, and wherever possible, adhering to shadows cast by the mighty network of overpasses above. When they came upon the grouped addresses Aria had supplied, Hovi halted them at their perch on a dumpster overlooking the backyards.

"Wow," she breathed, voice muffled by her simple mask. "This sure is some fancy real estate. You certain T'Pelas lives here?"

Aria nodded. "Got her record. This is the place. Eshia? Still have that police scanner?"

"Yep," she said, lifting her wrist to access the stolen application installed on her omni-tool. "Wanna go find her car?"

They deemed the suggestion favorable and headed into the community parking garage. Before venturing into the security cameras' cone of visibility, Eshia located a power box, smashed open the lock with her hammer, and tampered with fuses until she managed to overload the system. "Local power outage," she said with a shrug. "Happens sometimes, in storms like this. A manual reset should do the trick, but, at this hour and out in this weather? We've got loads of time."

Now invisible, they fearlessly strode through the sheltered lot, guided by ceiling-embedded sconces that bled yellow-orange like fire cutting into the damp night just beyond the bleak pillars and waist-high barriers of the structure's perimeter. Eshia led them with a beam of light emitted from her forearm. It danced over the identification plates of each vehicle and accessed a restricted database. Names of owners flickered by in the application window along with any warrants, of which there were none, attesting to the virtue of the surrounding community. And then they found it—Talyra T'Pelas's name listed beneath her identification photo, clearly attributed to one of the cars. Once again, Hovi was baffled.

"Wait, you sure?" she asked Eshia.

"Yeah, it's this one."

"How the hell does T'Pelas afford a nice-ass ride like this?" hissed Hovi. She drew closer to examine the vessel in greater detail. Its gorgeous gloss and streamlined body easily rivaled the beauty of Aria's car and was therefore certainly _not_ acquired through the relatively paltry wage of a lowly runner. "She's gotta have at least two other jobs to fund all this swank. I ain't complaining, though. Makes fucking it up all the more satisfying. Eshia, can you do something about the alarm?"

"I think so. Give me a few minutes under the hood."

As usual, Eshia's expertise was unparalleled. To test her sabotage she shut the hood and kicked in one of the front headlights, littering the concrete floor with bits of glittering glass. With bated breath they all awaited the shriek of the alarm, but it never assaulted their ears. Eshia grinned and faced them. "Who's first?" she asked.

"How's your appetite for vengeance, Aria?" Hovi turned to her. "I'll defer the honor to you, since you probably have a well-organized list of grievances addressed to Miss T'Pelas. Why don't you write them out on her windshield?"

"It'd be my pleasure," said Aria. Channeling her detest into the bat she wielded, her first decisive swing shattered the passenger window. The explosion of tinted glass sent Hovi and Eshia a few cautious steps backward, giving Aria ample space to express herself. Over and over she swung like a star athlete, obliterating the perfect paint job and leaving meek concavity in the place of proud manufactured curves. Occasionally the thunder and howling wind overlaid instants in which damage was inflicted, minimally reducing the impact of her violence. For a time her anger seemed indefatigable. Glass crunched and snapped beneath her boots when Aria eventually stepped away, panting while reviewing her penmanship. Not a single window or headlight was spared, making the vessel even unworthy of ground travel. Additionally, if T'Pelas could find a way to utilize the driver's door handle, Aria would have been impressed.

Hovi took great pleasure in spray-painting threats and lewd words on the sides of the vehicle while Eshia systematically destroyed the inner circuitry, tempted to steal valuable parts given the opportunity. She resisted pocketing anything, however, sobered by the possibility of serial numbers contributing to an eventual incarceration. Soon they too had left their personal marks on the formerly fine piece of machinery, reducing it to junk only a scrapyard could fully appreciate.

T'Pelas's garden was in the crosshairs of their wrath now. After hopping the wall and dropping down onto the marshy grass behind her residence, the vandals thoroughly dirtied themselves while overturning and shattering ceramic artisan pots serving as homes for vulnerable flowers. With the aid of their biotics they uprooted trees, disfigured and tossed lawn furniture over the walls—Hovi was delighted when an ejected chair landed in a neighbor's pool—and emptied their paint cans on the patio. The winds were wailing now, as if pained. The tall palms swayed, bent, but never broke while their oblong leaves, monochromatic in the pallid night, trembled wildly. Beyond the housing community a yellow traffic beacon blinked sporadically to guide commuters through the dark.

They weren't deterred by the conditions. They had dealt with flooding and seasonal storms like this all their lives, and one more posed only a mild inconvenience. Ianthe was constructed on the rivers and seas like a raft adrift, crowned by elegant lightning rods and turbines, and porous with deep underground channels, generators, and water recycling centers that tamed and made extensive use of nature's tremendous ambivalence. To the locals, a squall like this was merely a feast for the islands.

The garden was in ruins within a few minutes' time. Paint ran like bloody trails across the house's exterior and stone patio while loose plants lied strewn and shivering. They might have called it a night and departed in satisfaction had Aria not fixated on the balcony; a quaint little sitting area on which T'Pelas would lounge in the evening sun after emerging from glass doors likely leading to a bedroom.

Interpreting her temptation at a glance, Hovi was swift to react. "Don't even think about it." She clapped a hand onto Aria's shoulder. "We've done our job, took one for the team. Now let's get the hell out of here and into some dry clothes. Wanna come back to my place? I've got soup. You like soup, right? Or was it stew? Whatever. I've got that too, okay? Let's go."

Aria didn't respond. She had that look about her, in her stiff body language. The ominous narrowing of attention that preluded an imminent action which could not be impeded, seen in the way her fingers curled slowly inward.

"Aria…"

She sharply shrugged away from Hovi's touch. "I'm going up there," she announced. "I need to make sure she knows who she's fucking with. I need to make sure she'll never even _think_ about coming after Ynara."

"You're crazy," said Hovi. Beside her Eshia had arrived to identify what they were fussing about. "What if she realizes who we are? She'll have Atesi put targets on our backs! We'll have every cop in the fucking city breathing down our necks after tonight! Maybe even set her beast loose on us!"

"She's not going to tell anyone anything," Aria insisted. "Don't you worry about that."

"I don't like that tone." Though her face was concealed, a grimace could be heard on Eshia's voice.

Before either of them could get in another argument Aria biotically leapt to the balcony's railing. She gripped the bars and pulled herself up the rest of the way until nearly out of sight, and that was most frightful of all to her companions. Still wanting a say in whatever mess Aria might pull them into by association, Hovi and Eshia followed her. When their boots touched down on the balcony they found Aria hard at work with the lock. She had jammed the ice pick into the mechanism and was prying open the panel, exposing to the harsh elements all the inner workings of the capacitive touch pad. Eshia would have provided help had Aria needed it, but within a minute they heard the soft click of the lock disengaging. Carefully, Aria began rolling open the sliding door and peeling back the cream-colored curtain. One by one they filed through the narrow entrance and commemorated their first invading steps onto T'Pelas's carpeting with unsightly smears of mud.

Just as she had predicted, Aria found herself in a bedroom. A wardrobe, a closet, an armchair. And a bed filled by a single occupant. Behind her Hovi and Eshia stood like statues, frozen by the trepidation of being so close to the one person they wanted to avoid most during this operation. It hadn't even occurred to them to shut the door behind themselves. Rain was spilling in liberally through the aperture along with a shrilly whistling gale, soaking the floors and furniture and saturating the mud until it flowed again.

Aria found T'Pelas's resistance to the sound curious. She hadn't stirred at all. Initially she had thought her deep sleep advantageous. Her pulse pleasantly quickened when she indulged in the reverie of jolting T'Pelas from her dreams with the muzzle of a gun held firmly beneath her jaw, immediately throwing her into a disoriented terror. So appealing was this idea to Aria that she headed for the bedside to grant it reality. Disregarding the frantic hisses erupting from her allies, her hand darted forward to tightly grip T'Pelas's shoulder. She threw her onto her back, drew her dhaka from her pants—much to the sheer horror of Hovi and Eshia, once again—and brutally pressed its barrel to her victim's cheek.

A vicious string of curses and threats teetered on the edge of her tongue. She was prepared to unleash them the moment T'Pelas acknowledged her in panic, but when a second passed and yielded no response, the intoxicating surge of adrenaline coursing Aria's veins seemed to go cold in an instant, condensing in her stomach like solid nausea.

She released T'Pelas. There the runner lied inert, her dull sightless eyes turned upward at the ceiling. Still in her night gown.

An unintelligible sound escaped Hovi's lips when a bolt of dread gored her, sending her tripping over her own feet as she scrambled for the balcony in retreat. She toppled to the floor where her remaining composure exponentially decayed. Beside her, Eshia appeared completely inanimate. She had no words, no motion with which to convey her shock. All cognition had stalled.

Aria peered at both of them. Her irises quivered as her mind raced, trying to gather her bearings and make sense of their situation. She forced herself to look back at T'Pelas. The sheets cradling her were soiled with blood that had oozed from her temple sometime earlier in the night. Wet, but drying. The wound was messy. Cracked skull, Aria thought. Someone had hit her _hard_ with a blunt object, and the lack of disarray in both her room and on her body led Aria to believe that she had been killed in her sleep. Never afforded a chance to defend herself.

"Oh Goddess," Hovi was muttering. "Holy shit… Holy _shit_ … What the _fuck—!?"_

"Shut up!" Aria snapped at her. "I'm trying to fucking think, okay?"

Hovi did her best to keep quiet, but defaulted to whimpering. Ultimately, it didn't matter. The noise they generated had already permeated the house, motivating a lingering presence into action. When they heard it, they stilled themselves and tuned their senses to the slightest disturbances. They could all hear it; footfalls ascending the staircase. Soft, deliberate, but unhurried and growing ever louder, ever closer to their location. Aria flicked off the safety on her gun and took aim at the bedroom's door, the sole barrier separating them from whoever lurked just beyond, hunting them.

They watched the handle turn. Aria squeezed the trigger the moment she saw a body, but witnessed the round zipping uselessly against a kinetic barrier before hitting the floor, robbed of all its deadly inertia.

There standing in the doorway veneered in biotic light was the monster freed from reasonable confinement. One with whom conflict was to be avoided at all costs by the behest of their manager, and not solely due to her dangerous connections to Gaila Atesi. The monumental score of deaths attributed to her name was enough cause for any rival, enemy, or ally to provide a constant wide berth. The kingpin killer, some said of her. The elite commando who used to topple entire cartels by cleaning out the chairmen, sometimes in one fell swoop back in the days when she officially worked with Atesi as retired military turned police. A few steps away from Justicar, they used to say, until expedience and greed turned her away from something as restrictive as the Code. Now justice was dealt by her hand according to simple whim and desire, validated by all-consuming self-righteousness.

Neris.


	3. Chapter 3

CHAPTER 3

* * *

Aria had shot at her on reflex after spending scarcely a half second identifying her target, but no offense contorted Neris's features when she surveyed the dark figures near the dead runner's bedside. Rather, her gray eyes gleamed with vivid recognition and interest as though the masks the trio wore had suddenly lost all opacity. Neris peered, in particular, at the one still holding the gun leveled at her forehead, ready to fire given any excuse. That the bullet was destined to impotently glance off the commando's barrier again made Aria's statement one of simple defiance, spite, and aggression. Baseless, save for the pride she faithfully clutched.

Neris was unarmed. Or, if she possessed a weapon, it was well concealed beneath her ensemble of cheap gray sweatpants pants cuffed up past her ankles and a wrinkled sleeveless shirt, both very likely to have been stolen or borrowed from certain benefactors. Nevertheless, Aria tracked every move she made, interpreting each twitch as errant and threatening regardless of subtlety.

She had seen Neris's face before, on old news broadcasts chronicling the day she was arraigned on numerous offenses and when she was eventually disbarred from the city police. She had stiff, squared features rounded out by healthy flesh that had surely defined her before the angularity of a pugnacious adulthood. Here, the murky shadows of the room colluding on her skin only made her appearance exceptionally lurid.

"She said you'd come," said Neris. A grin was trapped behind unwilling lips, quivering at their corners but never manifesting. "And here you are. I was starting to worry that you wouldn't show. How about you sit down?"

Hovi lurched for the open balcony door. The moment her clawing hands reached its threshold, the door heeded Neris's biotic volition by violently slamming shut, catching a few fingers in the process. Hovi recoiled, shrieking in agony as she clutched her hand to her chest and withdrew into a writhing, sobbing ball on the muddy short carpet. Her friends looked to her with fearful concern, but Neris arrested their full attention before they could even consider aiding her.

"I said _sit down!"_ she shouted at them while jabbing an index finger downward. "I'm not going to fucking say it again! Talyra did some _damn_ good work for us, so show a little fucking respect in her house!" She gestured sharply at the bed.

Aria allowed her gaze to be guided by Neris's arm to were it eventually settled on T'Pelas. Seeing that hazy vacant stare, she reluctantly lowered her gun, along with herself, to the floor. The transition was slow and deliberate. Eshia seemed shocked by Aria's compliance but imitated her, not wanting to find out what Neris would do if she didn't.

Satisfied with their obedience, Neris addressed them again. "She said you'd come. Talyra said so earlier. Said you'd come, like we agreed, but that you'd also try to kill her. But something tells me only one of you came here to do that." She fixated on Aria, who had gone so rigid with anger she nearly trembled. "The other two… the imp—" She nodded at Hovi, who was still in tears. "—and the tree over there—" This time she indicated Eshia. "—look like they couldn't even put down a pyjak without shaking to pieces. But _you_ … Talyra was definitely scared of _you_ , if no one else."

"Then aren't we here for the same thing?" Aria forced the question from stiff vocal cords. "You killed her. Did my work for me."

"Did I?" Neris idly lifted a forearm across her chest and with her other hand, rubbed her skin in contemplation. "I just took care of a loose end. Atesi doesn't like loose ends. Neither do I. Especially given how expensive it is to keep them. Just look at this place… It's a dream. I'd kill for something like this, but I'm civilized. I care. I care about how it's a shame, throwing away good informants like that. Sometimes it just has to be done for the bigger picture. Like spring cleaning."

"She trusted you to protect her," Eshia breathed in horrified realization. "T'Pelas let you into her house because she thought you'd protect her from _us._ But you _killed_ her."

Neris ignored her. "I'm just here to do a job and get something in return. And here it is. There you are." Her focus, which maintained the integrity of a laser, remained solely upon Aria.

"Me?" Aria canted her head. "I don't fucking know you. You don't fucking know me."

"No," she shrugged in agreement. Then her expression darkened, revealing careful intent lurking behind the senseless cruelty she radiated. "But I knew your daddy."

Silence from all three, even Hovi, served as their collective reply.

"So, yes, I know damn well who you are, Aria. I've been meaning to find you for a long, long time. And I was sure to show my gratitude to T'Pelas for delivering you to me. Bought her this nice gourmet sundae before I came here and we had a relaxing conversation at her dinner table. She didn't finish it, but as they say, it's the thought that counts. Aria, you have to respect what I'm here for. Hell, I respect what _you're_ here for. Revenge. Because Talyra had your girlfriend's name, right? Was it Inera? Ynara? I have it written down somewhere—you get the idea. I'll be paying her a visit too soon enough."

Aria's wrath boiled over. She launched herself at Neris, fists cloaked in seething tendrils of biotics, aspiring to tear her apart the moment they made contact. But the experienced commando overpowered her, outmaneuvered her, with practiced ease. The force of her attack was reversed in a burst of light and Aria slammed back against the wall before she could devise another counter. She struggled to catch her breath after dropping to her knees, electrified and lightheaded, feeling as though all her bones and organs were rattling apart.

"Save it," Neris sneered at her. "I got what I came here for: confirmation. I'm not killing you tonight. I'm not killing any of you tonight. No, I can wait a day or two while this mess is swept up. For now, as far as anyone's concerned, I didn't kill Talyra. Conveniently for me, the vandals who got into her yard did."

"We didn't touch her!" Hovi exclaimed. She still cradled her wounded hand, and her cheeks were streaked with tears. "There's nothing here, no fucking evidence to link us to that! But you're all over this house, they'll find your fingerprints and everything—"

"And who's going to find them? Atesi?"

Hovi shut her jaw.

Neris nodded, looking pleased. "You know, you just gave me a good idea. I'm glad you opened your mouth, because you've got a point. Even with Atesi's help, it'll be a troublesome affair, framing the scene in a convincing way. You could help me out with that, come to think of it."

Against her will, Aria's arm was pulled out of its neutral rest and, like a puppet's limb, harshly articulated to Neris's liking: snapping straight at the elbow with her hand and dhaka aimed at Hovi. For a harrowing instant Aria's wide eyes met hers before she felt Neris's biotics pressing down on her knuckle to vicariously squeeze the trigger. The bang, interjecting the howling winds and clamor of debris outside, knelled in their ears. When Aria's hand was hers again, shock hindered her instinct to act. She thought she had killed her outright, but Hovi's gasps and cries told of her chance at survival.

"Bleed out right there, that's perfect. All over the carpet." Neris mocked them. "Leave a little something for the detectives to work with. Then _get out._ "

She was so unnervingly divested and enthusiastic both at once—exhilarated by having her quarries within reach, yet imbuing none of her words with the weight of consequence. She was a weapon, those living weapons that inspired Aria. But now, she saw, such weapons possessed no inherent gravitas. Presence needed to be cultivated, and in so strictly serving death her skill both exalted and derided her to the point of facultative decay. For all her obvious might, she commanded none of Aria's respect. Neris was merely a wild beast to be feared. She was a gun without a marksman. Or perhaps, Atesi was her marksman from afar. Alone, she was erratic, narrow-sighted, and cavalier.

Making use of the opportunity, Aria and Eshia scrambled over to Hovi and braved her distress as they grabbed hold of her. They lifted her from the floor, threw open the balcony door, and with a last hateful glare thrown over her shoulder, Aria witnessed Neris's despicable complacency.

"You'll be seeing me again soon, Aria," she said, and smiled. "When I come by to fucking kill you."

Together they shuffled out onto the balcony, but not before Aria heard Neris speak a final time, "I've been waiting! Waiting for a chance to finally get my hands on that bastard's little baby girl and _fucking choke her_ —!"

Her last words were lost to the storm when Eshia and Aria raced through the destroyed garden with their weapons and Hovi as their fragile cargo. Their boots sank into mud with each stride and dark prints defaced the sidewalks as they made their way back to Eshia's car, driven by a swiftness equally appropriate in the case of Neris being at their heels, pursuing them like a devil.

After dumping their supplies into the car's storage, Eshia leapt into the driver's seat and started the vehicle while Aria deposited both herself and the highly distressed Hovi in the back. She ordered Eshia to turn on the ceiling light so she could assess their wounded companion.

"Oh Goddess!" Hovi wailed. "I don't want to die! Oh Goddess… I don't want to die! I don't want to die…! My mother's birthday is next week! I was gonna take her to dinner—!"

"Shut up!" Aria snapped at her. "If you don't calm down you're just going to fucking bleed out and die faster." She brusquely yanked up the hem of Hovi's damp black jacket and scanned her torso for the source of blood. When she found it, Aria released her held breath. "You're fine," she said, then found the simple white shirt she'd left in Eshia's car after they disembarked. Aria wrapped it around Hovi's waist, padded one side heavily using the folded sleeves, and knotted it.

"What's going on?" Eshia said. She whirled around to peer over her seat once she programmed the autopilot. "Is she okay?"

Hovi sobbed incoherently, but Aria understood her state. "She's fine," she repeated the prognosis. "It grazed her side. It's a bad scratch; I think she'll need stitches. But there's nothing internal going on."

"Fuck," Eshia breathed in relief. "Holy _shit…_ Hovi… You're the luckiest fucker alive, you know that?"

At last, Hovi was starting to settle down now that the encroach of death was not so imminent.

"She wasn't lucky," Aria muttered. "If Neris wanted to kill her, she would have _aimed_ to kill." Morbidly, Aria formed a mock-gun with her fingers and pointed at Hovi's forehead, then met Eshia's gaze to further support her argument. "She let her live on purpose. She let us all live on purpose. To frame us. There's nothing lucky about it." The intensity of her expression returned suddenly as she remembered another point of peril. "Hovi, did you leave any blood on the floor? Did you?"

"Wha—?"

"Did you bleed on the floor!?"

"I—I don't know!"

If Hovi were in better health Aria might have gripped her by the shoulders and shook her until she remembered, but she relented, lifting a hand to her forehead to instead rub her temples. It was much too late to destroy any evidence of their trespass, and Neris was too delighted to have it. They could only hope that Hovi's hooded jacket had absorbed all the blood she had lost, and their footprints remained the only factor Neris could use to exonerate herself.

"Oh Goddess," Hovi sighed. "I've never been that scared in my life… Fucking hurts like a bitch, but if I'm gonna live I don't even care anymore…"

"You're not out of the woods yet," Aria reminded her. "We need to properly clean and dress it. If you get a bad infection you could die anyway. And I think your fingers are fucking broken… They'll need to be set. Eshia, do you have medical supplies at your place?"

"Yeah, I don't think my roommates would be too pleased to see us like this at four in the morning. I mean, fuck them, but I only have some bandages and pain meds in my bathroom. No gauze or splints, not even disinfectant."

"I'd take her back to my apartment, but…" Aria shook her head. "I can't with Ynara there. We can't even take her to a hospital because they'll have to file with the police, and that'll be the end of us. All right, I have another idea. Reroute to Pirwa's. She knows a thing or two."

"Pirwa?" Hovi echoed disdainfully. "She's probably in a coma right now, and even if we wake her up there's no way I'm letting that drunk bitch near me with chemicals and needles. Just take me to my mom, please? I wanna see her. I'll come up with a story, like we've been drinking and I fell off a roof, or got mauled by someone's pet."

"You know she'll want to take you to a hospital," said Eshia. "Especially if an animal mauled you."

"Fuck," Hovi conceded with a wince. "All right, all right. Take me to Pirwa. But one of you better watch her whenever she's got anything sharp in her hand, okay? If she carves me up like a dinner roast we'll _have_ to go to a hospital, and then all of our necks will be on the chopping block."

They reached Pirwa's modest apartment and toted Hovi into the elevator. The obscenely late hour ensured no encounters with residents, and the footage captured by security cameras would only depict intemperate revelers dragging themselves to refuge. After hurrying along the fourth floor they located Pirwa's door, knocked loudly, and waited a while before pounding with their fists. Eventually Pirwa answered the door, looking distinctly undead. They nearly trampled her upon entry, flicked on the front room lights, and laid Hovi across the sofa where they propped her up. While Eshia retrieved Pirwa's medical supplies, Aria used her forearms to shovel clear a low table stacked with tawdry swimsuit magazines and empty food containers. Eshia quickly returned with the medicine cabinet's contents in her arms and spread them out across the space Aria had provided.

Pirwa was lost to a confused stupor for at least five full minutes. Slurred questions and complaints stumbled off her tongue as she meandered over to the scene, sliding her weight against her walls and furniture to keep upright.

With the makeshift operating area sufficient, Aria apprehended Pirwa and led her to Hovi, but was forced to rouse her from the heavy daze. She slapped her face with her palms and shook her to elicit offense, a desired sign of sentience not previously expressed. Upon successfully communicating the situation to her, Pirwa sat down at Hovi's side and told Aria and Eshia to find a painkiller—but no anticoagulants, she drawled, and shoved the clattering medication bottles in their direction for them to read. Trusting their judgement, Hovi downed two selected pills with a glass of water. They listened to her hiss when Pirwa applied disinfectant to her wound, then sob with grief as a needle was threaded through her skin.

For a time Aria and Eshia spectated but said nothing else, consigning themselves to a dark corner of the room where they sat demoralized and exhausted.

Aria modified her posture to draw her gun from her pants. After ejecting the magazine, she spilled its ammunition into her hand and counted the bullets. Two were missing, as expected, lying somewhere in T'Pelas's house. She wondered if one had Hovi's blood on it, or if its searing strike against her flesh had been too swift to draw blood until it had already passed. She also wondered if Neris wanted to keep them at the crime scene. If Aria were in her place she would have removed them. T'Pelas's autopsy would undoubtedly find blunt force trauma as the cause of death, but with evidence of gunfire thrown into the mix, a new element would be added to the investigation. And Aria didn't see Neris as someone who abided unfavorable complications.

"So," Eshia said, pulling Aria from her thoughts. "What the hell was Neris going on about when she mentioned your father? Why does she want to kill you so badly?"

She shut her eyes and exhaled heavily. "I don't know. My father had a lot of acquaintances. Friends _and_ enemies. We didn't even know much about the latter until after he died."

"Like, what? Was he a con man or something?"

Aria refilled the magazine before sliding it back into the gun. When it clicked into place she aimed it, briefly and cathartically, at a framed band poster. "We think he had mafia ties," she said. "Off-world, of course. Smugglers, pirates, slavers. You name it."

"Shit," swore Eshia. "So Neris wants revenge for… something big, I'm assuming. But going after his daughter? You must've been a little schoolchild when he wronged her. How does killing you accomplish anything?"

"Satisfaction," Aria replied with a shrug. "Satisfaction is all she needs. It's why I wanted to kill T'Pelas. I don't need a gun to scare someone. No. A gun has one use."

The confession temporarily robbed Eshia of her ability to speak. "You… You really wanted to kill her?" she rasped, following a bout of stammering. "You were actually going to do it, right there in front of us?"

Aria held her jaw stiffly as she ruminated, avoiding Eshia's eyes. She was unsure of the answer herself, but knowing her own natural tendency to be carried to extremes by pining and spite, the likeliest scenario was a grim one. Her weary mind uncovered disquieting surrealism in the fact that T'Pelas would have died tonight no matter which party visited her home. So what distinguished Aria from Neris, when both professed identical intent and capacity for murder? Certainly, Neris had been the one to physically deal the death blow, but she only had the privilege because she arrived first. It was such a simple exercise for Aria to imagine herself as the commando, standing over T'Pelas's bed during the tense, decisive seconds preceding an execution.

"Ow—shit!" They heard Hovi exclaim. "Hey! Are you two even watching her? I feel like a fucking pincushion!"

"'S _fine,_ " Pirwa managed to verbalize. "I'm gonna be a doctor, 'member?"

Aria obliged her only for a short while. She rose from her seat, announced her need to go home, and demanded their company lie as low as possible over the next few days. However, Eshia gave her pause when she commented on how the advice seemed most applicable to Aria alone since Neris had singled her out by name, but no one else. It was entirely feasible that the rest of them had retained absolute anonymity.

. . .

Aria stepped into the warm familiarity of her apartment and on instinct migrated to her bedroom first, cradling her muddy gear in her arms. She paused near the bedside to spy Ynara sleeping, in her clothes, beneath her sheets, in her home, tranquilly—just as she left her. Without generating noise, she unglued herself from that spot to hide her laundry in her closet. She found something clean to wear to bed and retreated into the bathroom where she washed her face and hands and changed. When Aria automatically moved to withdraw her gun from her pants before pulling them down, she recalled after a brief instant of panicked disorientation how she had returned it to her car's locked glovebox, along with the metal bat borrowed from Eshia which lied hidden beneath a spare blanket in the storage compartment. She felt naked without either on her person, jarringly so.

She slipped into bed as gently as she could, but upon glimpsing the clock at the base of her lamp, which foretold the sunrise being a little less than an hour away, a twisting urge to grieve pulled at her from the pit of her stomach. Instead she resolved by extending an arm to reset her alarm for much, much later than typical.

Ynara moved behind her, roused by her fiddling with the device. Her legs rubbed against hers and she draped an arm over her waist to bring herself closer, where she could very quietly whisper against the nape of Aria's neck, "How is Pirwa?"

"She's okay," Aria answered. Her gaze never deviated from the teal numbers glowing on the clock. "She was just being dramatic. Puked a few times, spilled her guts about a some personal problems. But she'll be okay."

"That's good," said Ynara. She hummed as if to reaffirm her judgement. "You're a good friend to her. She's lucky to have you."

Aria gave a wry exhale. "Lucky," she repeated, sampling the term. The stillness of her body and the comforts of her bed were rapidly eroding her lucidity.

A delicate kiss was placed against the vertebra at the base of Aria's neck. "I want to stay over more often. Is that something you'd be all right with?"

"You can stay over whenever you feel like it," Aria told her. She allowed her eyes to shut, then added softly from a place in her conscience losing its guard, "I'm crazy about you. Everyone knows it."

"How crazy?"

She heard the pleasure in Ynara's voice, and could feel kind arms embracing her about the waist as she balanced precariously on the edge of rest. "Very," said Aria.

. . .

She twisted the neck between her fingers, watching the glass base of the sauce bottle swivel on the table. Silvery fish glittered on the foreground of the label, metallic and dart-like, over a porthole view of a calm blue sea at twilight. The company's name, along with the flavor of sauce—a spicy variety—framed the scene in steely banners. Soon it all rotated out of sight, bringing to Aria's vision the ingredients and nutritional information.

It was a commendable achievement and to her credit as a negotiator that Aria was able to persuade Ynara to have breakfast with her before she went home to Dishala, who was worried about as much as they had anticipated: terribly. But the diversion wouldn't last forever. They could only spend so much time at the diner, and Aria anxiously anticipated the inevitable loss of her company. With Neris's eyes locked upon Ynara's residence, it was entirely possible for her to appear the moment they pulled up to the driveway. And she was the sort of demon capable of operating in broad daylight. She could part bustling traffic with her halberd demands while rays of bright sunlight exalted her by exposure rather than diminish.

If anyone could commit murder on a public street and remain a free citizen, Neris could.

A waitress set down a plate of hot food and a few dining utensils in front her. She smiled at them before asking if they required anything else. Aria had already applied her condiments and was cutting into her meat link by the time Ynara said they had everything they needed at the moment, and courteously thanked her. Famished by the eventful night and uncertain of what was to come, Aria ate heartily and zealously, isolated from the rest of the cheerful diner in her own reclusive sphere of contemplation.

Hovi was messaging her. Transparent orange words projected from her personal device discreetly glided over her wrist and the back of her hand, and periodically she would abandon her food to reply.

 _Called my mom earlier_ , Hovi wrote. _Never thought I'd actually be happy to hear someone call me Hoventiana. I'm still shaking. How are you and Ynara?_

 _We're fine,_ replied Aria. _Having a late breakfast. How's your side?_

 _I'll say. It's past noon. And it's healing all right. No more bleeding. Really wish you hadn't shot me in the first place, though. Wish you hadn't even brought it._

Aria sighed, her agitation gradually unfurling in the breath. She keyed a response. It began, _I shouldn't have brought it_ , but another message from Hovi appeared in her inbox and infected her composition with obsolescence.

 _I'm sorry I said that_ , wrote Hovi. _I'm just bitter and uncomfortable right now. You didn't know what was going to happen, and you weren't the one who shot me. That was Neris, all the way._

She backspaced and decided against responding. Turning back to the table, Aria spent a few minutes guiltlessly enjoying her food and warm tea beneath the soft slats of light spilling through the window blinds at her side. She delivered forkfuls to her mouth as if it were the last opportunity in the world, conflicted between savoring and hastily devouring. Ynara had taken notice and eyed her curiously.

"Woke up hungry?" she inquired. From her seat opposite Aria's, Ynara dined at a far more reserved pace, but she had ceased altogether for the moment to await an answer. She was wearing clothes she had earlier selected from Aria's wardrobe with poetic care.

"Starving," admitted Aria. Her utensils lightly squeaked against the surface of the plate as she sliced away another bite, then looked down again to view what else Hovi had to say.

 _I stayed over Pirwa's last night after Eshia went home. The sick taking care of the sick, I guess. I explained to Pirwa what happened the best I could. We knocked out quick but woke up early. That's when I decided to do some digging. Called up some friends and started theorizing. You see, one of my trusted sources said T'Pelas had several indirect talks with the manager over the last couple months. It's interesting, since this timeframe definitely coincides with her working for Atesi. Maybe the manger knew about it. Or maybe she was just rightly suspicious. I don't know._

The lines of text continued passing over her skin, virtually interminable. Aria never paused their procession or glanced away, appearing to Ynara as fixated and perhaps a little rude. Not realizing the dire subject matter, she sought to steal her attention.

"Would you ever date an alien?"

Aria's blue eyes flitted upward to find Ynara's after reading Hovi's supposition: _I find it funny how Atesi was signing T'Pelas's fat impetus checks without the manager realizing, you know? Hiding a condo like that from the manager would be next to impossible. Would jut right out of her books like a high-rise in a shanty town._

"I know it's an odd question," said Ynara, "but I was just curious. I've only ever seen you express interest in asari."

After blinking, an action that marked her delayed transition between topics, Aria replied, "I don't see why not. Asari aren't all I like. Aliens have interesting qualities to offer sometimes."

"What about male aliens?"

Upon Aria's wrist read, _I'm starting to suspect something's going on here. Why send us? The manager has some harder hitters on the bench. And why did T'Pelas know your name but not the rest of ours? You're more careful than anybody. Always checking that rear-view camera and dropping fake names…_

"I don't know," Aria said. "Is the difference that significant?"

"Well, they often have… parts that are more dissimilar to ours than the females. So intimacy would probably be a bit different."

"I haven't given it much thought. But I would try almost anything once."

 _What if the manager gave your name to T'Pelas? Or what if Atesi hired T'Pelas because she knew you rolled with us and wanted to arrange our encounter with Neris? Weren't you arrested that one time? I remember how they let you go, but that shit stays on the books, so Atesi could've found it. But then how does she profit from all this?_

"Something happened last night," Ynara stated. The gravity of her words had Aria regarding her with an intensity of interest not bestowed to any previous matter that morning. She watched Ynara lay her dining ware on her napkin, conveying utmost severity. "I'm right, aren't I?"

No sound escaped Aria's lips. Only her stare, wide with frozen alarm, remained for Ynara to interpret. Hovi's next speculation, _What if the manager and Atesi were using us (you) like fucking bargaining chips in a bid to keep the heat off this outfit for a while?_ went unread. _Or worse… What if they're collaborating now and we're the currency—a favor for Atesi's favorite biotic missile?_

"Did something happen with Pirwa?" Ynara's accusatory tone was receding into genuine concern. Evidently, Aria's staunch reticence was alarming her. "What happened?"

She shook her head, even as Ynara reached across the table and gently laid a hand atop hers.

"Aria, sweetheart…"

She inhaled. Ynara had never called her that before. Hearing the word on her voice for the first time made her heart feel turgid, heavy, and strained at the seams by restless blood. On her wrist meanwhile read, _Shit, Aria… if that bitch is after you right now, and if T'Pelas got her info from the manager, she might know where you live. You need to stay away from there, get a hotel room or something._ This time, she caught sight of the text and promptly deactivated the device.

"Are you…" Ynara's voice dropped so considerably in volume it skirted a whisper. "Are you in trouble?"

Aria raised her spare hand to rub at her eyes, then glanced petulantly at the luminous window. When she reunited her gaze with Ynara's she remained largely unresponsive for an extended moment before inclining her chin with the smallest nod imaginable.

"How much trouble?"

"A lot," she uttered.

Ynara sympathetically stroked her hand. "Aria… I know there's a lot you keep from me," she said. "I've known for a while now that you have your own little world where I can't follow you, and that you have good reasons for keeping me away from it. And now I'm thinking this is related to that world. Am I right?"

A unique frustration was writhing in Aria's stomach. Her thoughts raced without reason, darting from the poisonous temptation to weave a clever lie, to an urge to spill her fear of death as if to vomit, and to how she was pettily wishing they had ordered a lunch of barbecued sandwiches instead of breakfast platters. Then all the inner noise congealed as swiftly as it had arisen, never violating the composure of her stare as Aria answered, "I'm wanted out of the picture."

Ynara paled dramatically, obviously not having expected such dire circumstances. "As in…?"

Aria nodded. "I don't want you getting caught in the middle of everything," she said. "I'm coming up with a plan. Some way to get you home without a confrontation, and to make sure you'll be safe afterward."

"A-and leave you alone? No. Absolutely not." Even as she proclaimed so, Ynara trembled. "That's not how this works."

No words left Aria's lips for a time. Her line of sight dropped to her plate, and to the morsels she had yet to eat. "Hovi seems to think I should skip town," she said at length. "But I don't let other people hunt me like some animal, and I don't flee or hide like one either. When I leave places, it's on _my_ terms, and my affairs are resolved to _my_ liking."

"Do you always have that luxury?"

"So far, I have."

When the waitress came by again, Aria paid the check. She and Ynara morosely finished eating before exiting the diner. They emerged into the glaring sunlight and relentless summer humidity, navigating plant debris and shallow puddles while returning to Aria's car as a more private space in which to discuss the troubling predicament. Ynara avoided treading in them. Aria wetted the soles of her shoes without care.

Now seated in the shade cast by a row of voluminous waxy trees dividing the property from the next, Aria shut her door and stared at the dashboard, devoid of all overt emotion. Ynara asked if she was afraid.

"Afraid of dying? Yes," said Aria. "Afraid of Neris? No."

"Neris? Neris as in… on the news a few months ago _for grisly murder_ Neris?"

"Yes."

"Goddess, Aria." Ynara reclined into her seat, suddenly overwhelmed. "Why would she be after you?"

Aria told her. She told her more than she wanted to, but with both of their lives threatened, she found herself with little choice. An executive account of the previous night was forfeited along with the true nature of Aria's employment and Hovi's speculations. Oddly enough, Ynara was relatively unsurprised by any of her exploits and resulting misfortune. It was only when Aria expressed the need to confront Neris that Ynara objected.

"Why?" She interrupted her. "Why in the world would you need to validate her insane revenge quest? You haven't done anything to her. You're not your father."

"No, I'm not. That's why confronting her is so necessary. I've been unreasonably singled out for something I didn't do. When people do injustices to you, they need to know it, and pay for it."

"She'll _kill_ you. She kill you within seconds. It won't even remotely be a fair fight."

"If it's not a fair fight I'll _make it_ fair."

"How?" A plead for reconsideration sounded in Ynara's question. "How will you do that?"

She shifted against the upholstery of the driver's seat and folded her arms across her chest to ponder a moment. Staring outward at the scaled trunks of trees shading them, Aria devised an answer that only satisfied herself, "By being smarter than her." She started the engine.


End file.
